Linguistic Acculturation Preferences, Conflict, and Cultural Enrichment: The Case of Preservice Teachers in Catalonia

One of the main objectives of the educational system in Catalonia (Spain) is to strengthen social cohesion, promote intercultural education, and advance the use of the regional language (Catalan) within a multilingual framework.

To achieve this, it is essential for preservice teachers to develop multilingual linguistic acculturation preferences towards the descendants of migrants that move away from assimilationist stances. These assimilationist perspectives tend to perceive disruptive behavior more readily in these students, hold lower educational expectations for them, and often exclude them from discussions about the "ideal student."

Within this context, and situated in Catalonia (Spain), the aim of this paper is to analyze the linguistic acculturation preferences of preservice teachers toward the descendants of Moroccans and Latin Americans. Subsequently, it seeks to compare these preferences and explore their influence on the perceived levels of conflict and cultural enrichment.

The results are based on a survey administered to 654 preservice teachers in Catalonia. Descriptive statistics, analysis of variance, and logistic regressions were used for the analysis.

The main findings suggest that linguistic acculturation preferences are predominantly multilingual towards both the descendants of Moroccans and Latin Americans, although there are more assimilationist tendencies in the case of Moroccans. The study also reveals how the perceived level of conflict and cultural enrichment is mediated by these acculturation preferences.